Actually there are several cultures that live off primarily milk: and the Masai drink more milk than they eat blood. Milk is an exception though, in that it's purpose is to nourish an animal that is ONLY drinking milk, so it is a very complete food. Milk also has lactoferrin, so it might make drinking blood safer.
The Masai also apparently eat a LOT of fat, as do the Inuit, and I'm guessing that in the circumstance where there is more fat than the body can use right away, some of it isn't absorbed and so that will create the needed butyrate. When you eat too many carbs, your body pretty much tries to absorb all of them anyway, but that might not be true of fat (excess fat in stools is pretty common).
However, milk isn't "low carb" either, so if someone is avoiding salads because of carbs, they probably wouldn't be drinking milk either. I don't know how much butter you'd have to eat every day before enough of it becomes butyrate either.
I also think the milk/blood thing is over-stressed. First, today their diet has changed a lot, and in the past, the scientists have often done a poor job of truly documenting a diet, focusing on the most visible foods (which are often just the ones the tribe wants to talk about). Fecal samples are a better measure of what people eat, and in most of those, non-farming people eat a wide variety of foods. But the Masai do eat other foods:
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So far, the research team has identified some 25 plant products used by the Maasai Among them are latex from the Ficus tree and roots and barks of various plants which are chewed to alleviate thirst. A second plant gum, which may have hypolipidemic (serum cholesterol-lowering) properties, is produced by a species related to the myrrh plant. Myrrh has been valued since biblical times for its medicinal properties.
Another source of antioxidants is Acacia nilotica, whose bark the Maasai use to flavour their meat soups and milk. Some crude acacia extracts seem to have stronger antioxidant properties than either vitamin C or vitamin E — the most popular antioxidants sold in the North.
Another source of antioxidants is Acacia nilotica, whose bark the Maasai use to flavour their meat soups and milk. Some crude acacia extracts seem to have stronger antioxidant properties than either vitamin C or vitamin E — the most popular antioxidants sold in the North.
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Drinking milk though is one of those things where genes make a difference. Some portion of the population today has ancestors who did rely a lot on milk, and likely those people can live off it pretty well. There is a fascinating look at this:
On Tue, Jun 29, 2010 at 10:30 AM, carolyn_graff <zgraff@charter.net > wrote:
what about the Masai people in Africa eating only meat, blood and milk? no veggies.
http://www.healingnaturallybybee. com/articles/ foods26.php
--- In fast5@yahoogroups.com , Heather Twist <HeatherTwist@...> wrote:
>
> The BAS contains polysaccarides. Polysaccarides are "sort of" digestible ...
> that is, your body doesn't actually use them directly, but they feed the
> bacteria in your lower gut. Those bacteria produce butyrate which does 2
> things: 1) Kills colon cancer cells and 2) Nourishes the gut cells (they
> prefer butyrate for fuel).
>
> The only way to get butyrate to the lower gut is to eat polysaccharides. It
> *can* be produced from fat, notably butter, but normally the fat is absorbed
> before it gets to the lower gut. And if you eat butyrate ... it's in some
> foods, but it stinks ... then it gets absorbed in the upper gut and doesn't
> reach the colon.
>
---
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